Uffe Jørgensen, Section for Climate and Water, will lead Aarhus University’s new interdisciplinary centre CBIO

One of the global society’s greatest challenges is that we are well on the way to using more resources than the earth can provide. It is therefore imperative that we make the switch to a circular bioeconomy in which we transform waste to usable products and use valuable resources more efficiently – instead of producing, consuming and discarding.   

This is the background for the establishment of a new interdisciplinary centre in Science and Technology: Centre for Circular Bioeconomy (CBIO). The leader of the new centre will be senior researcher Uffe Jørgensen, Section for Climate and Water, who for years has worked with recycling and new biologically based products. 

Establishment of a new interdisciplinary centre for circular bioeconomy is right up Science and Technology’s alley. 

- At Aarhus University we have strong environments in all links of the circular bioeconomy chain. This is the case for everything from agricultural production, life cycle assessments and technology to environment, food and chemistry. With the new centre we can connect all these links to produce a fully connected chain. The centre will provide us with a formalised platform and the opportunity to get to know each other’s strengths better, says Uffe Jørgensen.    

Interdisciplinarity as a driving force

An important aspect of the new centre will be to strengthen inter-departmental collaboration in Science and Technology. Uffe Jørgensen mentions blue biomass as an example of how knowledge from different departments can come together for a common good. Blue biomass can be used for food, feed, fertiliser and possibly also as a measure against emission of nutrients from land-based food production to the aquatic environment. 

- Algae, mussels and starfish can uptake nitrogen and phosphorous in the marine environment and return these nutrients to the soil where they can become incorporated in food, feed and fertiliser. In this way, blue biomass can be a potential aquatic environment measure. This could prove to be a good way to close the circle, says Uffe Jørgensen. 

Research in the whole chain of blue biomass can thus involve the departments of Bioscience, Environmental Science, Animal Science, Food Science, Chemistry, Engineering and Agroecology and demonstrates in the best possible way how CBIO can unite the good forces in Science and Technology to create a common understanding of one of society’s crucial issues.   

Centre structure reflects ST’s diverse competences

With Uffe Jørgensen the leadership of CBIO is anchored in the Department of Agroecology, but it has a steering committee whose members come from each their department in Science and Technology. They represent and coordinate the activities within seven primary research areas:  

1. Cultivation and handling of green biomass (Agroecology)
2. Cultivation and handling of marine biomass (Bioscience)
3. Biorefining, conversion and recycling (Engineering)
4. Biobased materials and biooils (Chemistry)
5. Feedstuffs and byproducts (Animal Science)
6. Food and ingredients (Food Science)
7. Society and sustainability (Environmental Science)

You can also read the article “Aarhus Universitet indvier Center for Cirkulær Bioøkonomi” (in Danish). 

The Centre for Circular Bioeconomy (CBIO) will be inaugurated at an event in Foulum on May 23, 2017. You can read more about it here (in Danish).